University Daily Kansan Tuesday, April 12, 1955
Yearbook Staff Offers Ultimatum
The recent letter to the All Student Council from the editors of the Jayhawker presented the school with an ultimatum: either pay for the Jayhawker, or watch it suddenly fade away.
Editors of the Jayhawker stated in a letter to the Senate of the ASC that the book could not continue publication next year without a new plan of financing. The present system forces the Jayhawker to depend entirely on sales and advertising for revenue. The editors of the yearbook apparently feel that the magazine cannot continue operation on these resources.
Chancellor Franklin D. Murphy has ruled out direct University aid to the annual. In a statement to the Kansan, the chancellor said, "The Jayhawker is a student publication. I cannot justify supporting it with University state tax money."
"As chancellor, I must take responsibility for fee policy, and I must make the final decision on the matter."
The chancellor also mentioned the only proposal thus far advanced towards financing the Jawhawk.
This proposal would finance the yearbook with compulsory enrollment fee. Every student would be required to buy the Jayhawker at the beginning of the school year, and the annual would become a yearly charge along with the Student Union fee, and the activity card. It would be possible, under the proposal, to reduce the cost per student, but every student would have to buy a yearbook.
But, he said, the final decision cannot be left up to the student body.
Chancellor Murphy said, in discussing the proposal, that a committee of the ASC should study the matter and report to the student body on their findings.
The arguments of those proposing to make the Jayhawker a matter of compulsory fees insist that students are unable to make the choice about buying the Jayhawker because they do not need or want it as much now as they will in the future. Proponents of the system say that many alumni wish they had bought the Jayhawker while they were in school, that the Jayhawker becomes more important as time goes by.
Those backing compulsory buying also insist that the Jayhawker would be a better magazine if it were financed by compulsory fee. As one expressed it:
Proponents also argue that if the compulsory buying does not go through, KU will be the only major school in the nation without an annual yearbook.
"Editors of any kind of a magazine can compile a better product if they know how much money they have to work with."
Compulsory buying also would insure adequate funds for the yearbook. It would allow editors to budget their expenses ahead of time and provide more efficient management, proponents say.
Also, a majority of students who do want and do buy the Jay-hawker will be prevented from doing so by a minority which does not, backers of the plan assert. Compulsory fee financing would allow the majority to buy the magazine, and those who really do not want it don't have to bother to pick it up if they don't want to.
Opponents of the proposal, on the other hand, insist that a yearbook has nothing to do with school prestige, that whether a school has an annual should be a matter for the individual school to decide. If the school does not want a yearbook, opponents say, then we shouldn't have one. It should be an individual school matter, and prestige has nothing to do with the issue.
Opponents also say it would be better to have the yearbook limp along on inadequate funds than to charge students for something they do not want. Students have a hard enough time getting hold of $5 for the things they want to buy. It's not fair to charge even a minority for something they do not want and could get along without, opponents of the plan argue.
They also insist that proponents of the scheme have overplayed school spirit as a selling angle. Whether or not a student buys an annual, opponents say, has nothing to do with whether he has school spirit, and even if the two are connected, this is no excuse to tack a price tag on a student's devotion to his alma mater.
There are other arguments both pro and con, but no matter how loud the discussion someone—probably the administration—must decide on the matter before the end of the school year. The Jayhawker sent what amounted to an ultimatum to the ASC when it said either the Jayhawker must be financed in a different manner or go out of existence.
A student vote, with action by the administration on this vote,
promises to be an immediate issue. —Ron Grandon
A singular opportunity awaits us in the Banned and Burned Books exhibit which is now on display at Watson library. "Freedom of the press," as pleaded by Milton in 1844, is the theme of the exhibit.
One Woman's Opinion
Censorship has been imposed by states and religions from the earliest times. From Homer to Hemingway, authors have suffered bans and suppressions inflicted by individuals or groups in opposition to the expressed ideas.
And, because of censorship, valuable literature has been lost to the world. After the Roman conquest of Greece, only a single copy each of seven of Aeschylus' plays were found.
The battle for freedom of the press has been a continual one from the time of Milton to the present. Whitman lost his job with the Department of the Interior in 1860 when the Secretary found a copy of "Leaves of Grass."
Hemingway's 'Facewell to Arms' was banned in Italy in 1929 because of the description of the Italian retreat. There were the notorious book burnings in Germany before and during World War II. Entire libraries have been destroyed in times of war and mass hysteria.
Within recent years and months, we have had disputes over what Reda literature—Communist propaganda—is the best places, if any, it should be banned.
Mr. Rubinstein, chief bibliographer at Watson library, said the exhibit includes books from many countries and many eras.
The purpose of this is to show that no one country nor any one period of history is responsible for the suppressions.
Some of the books on exhibition will be from KU's rare book collection, but a great many are being borrowed from other sources, including Harvard. Between 75 and 100 books are on display.
Jovce Neale
One of only a number of thought-provoking philosophies Dr. Hilden R. Gibson used to tell his students every semester was: "One trouble with the world is its anonymity—everybody is just another number throughout his life and even death."
But Dr. Gibson, who died Friday, April 1 following an emergency brain operation, will not be remembered by his many friends as just another number.
Gibson Sought Name In World, Lived Full Life
Few persons meant so much to the University as the 44-year-old Dr. Gibson, whom former Chancellor Deane W. Malott called the best lecturer on the faculty.
Dr. Gibson was more than just another professor. In fact he was a full professor in three subjects—political science, sociology, and human relations, of which he was the only chairman since its founding here. Another attestation of his academic genius was that in only 16 years here he twice was granted leaves of absence to use fellowships at other universities, Harvard and Colgate.
He might occasionally deliver a spell-binding lecture or he might swing into a tirade on the "softness" of present day students. A favorite topic was an essay by John Dos Passos, "The Stopwatch," which would bring forth a condemnation of modern day dogmas or regimentation. His classes, among the more crowded on the Hill, dealt with much more than their given titles.
His students seldom knew what to expect from the learned and well-versed professor, who was a Phi Beta Kappa and in the initial class of Summerfield/scholars as an undergraduate.
The influence hereabouts of Dr. Gibson will live on
rte was anything but anonymous. —Stan Hamilton
10 Years Ago-And Today
Ten years ago today a 63-year-old man sat in a house in Georgia having his portrait painted.
The man was one of the most controversial figures in history. At 1:15 p.m. he complained of a "terrific headache."
At 3:35 p.m. Franklin Delano Roosevelt died of a cerebral hemmorrhage. ___
The scene was Warm Springs, Ga. the "Little White House." President Roosevelt had just returned from the Yalta conference with Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Russian Premier Josef Stalin.
He was "taking a break" from his busy schedule.
He was a tired and sick man.
"Boy, Tom's date is a real pig!"
Ten years ago today the Yalta conference had ended. Today, through the release of the Yalta papers, it lives again. Ten years ago today World War II was nearing a close. Today, the fear of a third world war is in the minds of many.
EVIDENTLY SHE BEEN TAKIN' CARE OF
THEM FOR YEAR'S ANN' WHEN HE SAW
ME' MAIN' THERE, A ARRB PIRCER'
THEIR LU' HEARTS ON ANY SYGRUNN'
OUT OF EM, SHE SLIPPED INTO THE TEA
CUAN AN...
Ten years ago today a New York artist was painting a portrait of a president. Today the portrait stands in the same spot as then—
John Herrington
Unfinished.
The largest pelican rookery in the west is on an island in Pyramid Lake, 35 miles north of Reno.
The smallest known fish in the world is the Pandaka pygmea. These are about the size of an ant and are almost transparent, the large eyes being the only feature clearly visible.
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