Daily hansan
Lawrence, Kansas
Tuesday, Dec. 17, 1963
61st Year, No. 63
Versatility Displayed By Rhodes Scholar
By Margaret Hughes
KU's 16th Rhodes Scholar has four majors, sleeps at least nine hours a night, and still subscribes to comic books.
Breon Mitchell, Salina senior, was selected last Saturday as one of this year's 32 Rhodes Scholars from the United States. Mitchell will leave next September for England, where he will study for a Bachelor of Philosophy degree at Oxford University.
The opportunity to attend Oxford is the most valuable part of the scholarship, Mitchell feels. "Oxford is one of the oldest and best universities in the world," he said. "Because of its colleges and its tutorial system, it has a perfect learning atmosphere for those who like to study on their own."
A RHODES SCHOLAR is given $2,520 for each of two years, and may reapply for a third year's grant. The only examination at Oxford comes at the end of the three-year program.
"The great thing about Oxford's set-up," Mitchell explained, "is that they have 24 weeks of school and 28 weeks of vacation." Rhodes Scholars are encouraged to "take advantage of the proximity of Europe" during their vacations.
"I plan to spend Christmas in Rome and Easter in Moscow," Mitchell said. "As for summer vacation—well, you can get a lot of places in four and a half months."
AFTER studying moral philosophy and aesthetics for three years at Oxford, Mitchell would like to get a doctorate from an American university, perhaps Yale. Then, a career of college teaching and creative writing.
The Rhodes selection is stiffly competitive. Last Wednesday, two finalists from Kansas were chosen from two candidates in Kansas City. Then the 12 finalists from Kansas, Minnesota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa, and Missouri met in Des Moines for interviews last weekend.
Breon Mitchell
"Everything happens on the same day," Mitchell said. "Each man has a half-hour interview with the selection committee. Then the committee discusses the candidates for several hours."
"WE SAT IN AN OUTER room, waiting for the decision. Finally the men came out and named the four winners. Everybody shook hands and went home."
There were no tests in the competition. "All the academic,
activity, and athletic records are about equal. What counts with the committee is their impression of the candidate, how he thinks, what he's read, what he wants to do," Mitchell said.
ABOUT THOSE COMIC BOOKS—Mitchell and one of his fraternity brothers, David White, Prairie Village senior, bought a long-term subscription to a Walt Disney comic book when they were freshmen. "It was too good a bargain to pass up," Mitchell said. "We figured we could get some mail every week that way."
Mitchell is president of Student Union Activities and a member of the College Intermediary Board. This year he was named outstanding national member of his fraternity, Phi Delta Theta. He is also a member of the varsity tennis team.
This summer, however, he plans to stay home with his parents. His father, a Salina doctor, is president-elect of the Kansas Medical Association. Mitchell has two brothers, one a KU junior.
Mitchell's academic, activity, and athletic records, however, are impressive. He will be the first KU graduate with four majors, namely philosophy, German, humanities, and art history.
A SUMMERFIELD SCHOLAR, he was named to Phi Beta Kappa during his junior year. He is also a member of Sachem and Owl Societies, honorary organizations for junior and senior men.
Mitchell's summers have been spent in Germany and France on the Summer Language Institutes, and touring Europe as a People-to-People student ambassador.
In addition, Mitchell is vice-president of the National German Honorary Society, and a member of the Union Operating Board, the Disciplinary Committee of the All Student Council, the Dean's Advisory Board, and the KU Memorial Corporation board.
Bolivian Tin Miners Release 4 Americans
LA PAZ, Bolivia—(UPP)—Four Americans held as hostages 10 days by rebellious miners at Catavi returned safely to La Paz today and prepared to go home for Christmas vacations.
A Bolivian military transport landed here with the Americans at 10 a.m. (9 a.m. EST) after an unevenful flight from Oruro, some 150 miles to the south. With them was U.S. Ambassador Douglas Henderson.
Friends and relatives jammed the two-mile-high international airport to give the freed hostages an emotional welcome.
Fergerstrom was the only one without anyone to greet him other than embassy officials at the airport. He was sporting a heavy black beard.
The Americans were Thomas M. Martin, 27, of New York, and Michael Kristula, 41, of Cadillac, Mich, and Niles, Ill., both U.S. Information Service officers, Bernard Rifkin, 52, of Brooklyn and Montclair, N.J., a U.S. aid adviser, and Robert Fergerstrom, 27, of Honolulu, a Peace Corps volunteer.
He said he was "crazily happy to be free." The young Peace Corpsman said their release came as a surprise. Even more of a surprise, he said, were the applause and cheers which greeted them when miners released them from the small room in a library where they had been held since Dec. 6.
WAITING FOR SANTA—Children of KU faculty members, students and Lawrence residents attend the KU Nursery School sponsored by the Home Economics Department, division of Child Development. They are being occupied by students like Judy Slaughter, Kansas City senior, while their mothers are busy Christmas shopping and preparing for the holidays. KU students in Child Development courses observe the children as part of their classroom assignment. (See related story on page 3)
KU Growth Marks Century Of Existence at Mt. Oread
(Editor's note: This is the first of three articles dealing with the history of the University of Kansas.)
By Charles Corcoran
The story of the University of Kansas is like a rich and colorful, patchwork quilt, and although it was begun almost 100 years ago, time has enhanced, rather than robbed it of its value.
KU's story is the story of a young United States; it's vibrant and full of the deeds of men with the ideals of youth.
IN 1856 a ten ace tract (the sight of the present Corbin Hall) was selected by Amos A. Lawrence, in whose honor the town of Lawrence was named, as a site for a state school.
Plans were started in 1859 to establish a college under the auspices of the Presbyterian church, but the plan did not materialize.
Then, the Congregationalists made plans to make use of funds Lawrence had set aside and gifts from various donors to establish a college on the site. The drought of 1863
Put on your parka, again, your mittens and scarf. Your skis might even come in handy, too—more SNOW is on the way.
Light snow is predicted to fall on Lawrence tonight, the Topeka weather bureau said. The snow will come with "mighty cloudy" weather which is already darkening the sky.
Today's high is predicted at 32 degrees, and tonight's low will be at 10 to 15 degrees.
More Snow Is Forecast
no predictions had yet been made about wind.
Tomorrow's forecast is: more
light snow and cloudier weather.
The high predicted for tomorrow is 20 degrees.
however, prevented the development of this plan.
THE EPISCOPALIANS took up the project, but due to a lack of funds and the war, they also had to drop the idea. Next, the city of Lawrence made its attempt. In August, 1863, the mayor of Lawrence took possession of the property in the name of the city. Quantrill's raid, however, prevented work on the erection of any buildings.
At last, in September of 1865, the tract was granted to the University
The first building, which came to be known as North College, was a "stern uncompromising structure" standing in the middle of the barren, wind-swept tract.
A STORY in the Jan. 20, 1920, edition of the University Daily Kansas pictures what might have been encountered then.
"It was more difficult to climb the hill in those earlier days when sidewalks were too great a luxury. The wind was usually blowing hard across the open prairie and it was no easy task to manage the stiff, long and very full skirts worn in that period.
"When it rained, it was terrible. But no doubt in those days as in these, some amorous lad, clad in all probability in blue jeans, with a goodly sprinkling of patches, feet encased in cowhide boots, aided the distressed young maiden up the slippery slopes," the article says.
An item from an 1878 edition of the University Pastime, the first publication by KU students, states tersely "Forty students were examined for entrance to the University at its opening, September 12, 1866. None were prepared for the work."
There were two courses of study, the preparatory and the collegiate
Attendance increased, however, and 55 students, 26 women and 29 men, were officially enrolled.
the preparatory and the collegiate. Prof. Robinson later stated that "We found the spring work had taken our brawny students to the farms. Several in the city, suffering from the unusual strain of headwork, were down with the 'spring fever.'
"BY MUCH VISITING and earnest missionary work among our patrons, we finally averted the threatened disgrace of abandonment, and closed our first year triumphantly with 22 students," Prof. Robinson said.
For clergymen's children, the $10 entrance fee was cut in half. If the undergraduate were an orphan of a soldier, or of one of those killed in Quantrill's raid, he was exempt, and invited to enter free.
"As far as can be determined," the Kansas stated in February, 1538, "the first student to enroll in the University was John William Fisher of Lawrence. Charles Edmund Fisher was probably right behind him, so at least it was probably one of the Fisher boys."
IN 1864, when the legislature passed the act providing for the University of Kansas, there were many old moralists in that memorable meeting who thought the presence of men and women in the same class would be derogatory for both. With this in mind, it appears, they tacked on Section 9 of the Act Providing for the Establishment of the University of Kansas:
"There shall be two branches of the University, viz., a male and a female branch. The female branch may be taught exclusively by women, and buildings for that branch shall be entirely separated from the buildings of the male branch. And to establish and maintain the said female branch, the regents shall annually appropriate a sufficient amount of funds for the University."
"FROM THE FIRST day of classes down to the present day there has been no discrimination against women in the University, although the original law was on the statute books until the second revision of the state satues in 1889," the story continues.
The September 22,1923 Kansan states that "The first students of collegiate rank at the University were two women who entered the school in 1867.