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UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN, LAWRENCE, KANSAS
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 1950
The Editorial Page-
Meet Mr. Bannigan
With calloused fingers and a shaft of aging homework assignments, the editor is retiring . . . as is the custom for editors who have completed an eight-week session as spokesman for the U.D.K. (Spokesman: one who formulates the opinions of a newspaper in his spare moments between visitations and telephone calls from angry readers who want the editor's apology for errors made by his staff.) We're not sure whether the callouses are the result of pecking a typewriter or clinching a club . . . in Elementary Golf.
He's a lecturer—completed a course called Public Speaking I. He's a radio consultant—spoke several words on KFUK.
Since normally curious individuals are inclined to desire proof of the suitability of executives, a list of Bannigan's qualities should speak for itself.
Since editorials are as essential to a newspaper as a fifth string is to a violin, the chief's desk will not begin collecting dust but will be occupied by (to be trite) an able, competent, aggressive young journalist—John Bannigan.
He's a big wheel on campus-drives a 1937 Chevrolet, and distinctive one at that. It has no radiator grill.
He's a novelist—wrote a short story for Trend, but the Quill club forgot to publish it.
He's an actor—took the part of the second gravedigger in the University's presentation of "Hamlet" last spring.
He's congenial—has completed two years of married life without returning to bachelorhood.
Since Bannigan has a surplus of spare time (he's enrolled in a mere 18 hours this semester) he will be eager to have readers continue filling the Kansan's mailbox with fan letters. John can take it on the chin—oops, we mean neck. After 44 months in the marine corps, he's a certified leatherneck.
He's a statesman—has resided in three states. . . . . New York, California, and Kansas.
He's a world traveler—visited Cuba during August and is still carrying a pack of Cuban cigarettes to prove it.
Seriously speaking, we can't think of a student to whom we'd rather hand the reins. John's a "real champion."
—Editor Emeritus.
Gesture To Spain
The United Nations Special Political Committee has voted to rescind the 1946 U.N. recommendation that all members withdraw their top diplomats from Spain. The action, which also would allow Spain to belong to such U.N. agencies as the World Health Organization, seems assured of final approval by the General Assembly.
Russia, as was to be expected, has jumped at the opportunity to attack the move as one dictated by United States military ambitions in Spain.
Granting the possibility that Spain might someday be important in a military showdown between Russia and the West, United States support of the U.N. gesture can be justified on other grounds. If war with Russia ever comes, Spain has only one choice any way, and this is to be on the side of the democracies. She is going to be on that side as a matter of expediency, regardless of who is for or against her now.
The current proposal is not to make Franco Spain a full-fledged member of the U.N. The agencies she would be invited to join are non-political in character. It is entirely possible, as Senator John J. Sparkman suggests, that the help she could get from these agencies would enable her to solve some of her internal problems. The result in the end could be to encourage reforms that would make Spain more acceptable in the family of nations.
It is in that spirit that the American people should accept this move, even though they dislike everything that the present Franco regime stands for.—St. Louis Star-Times.
Candid Comments
Ever since the attempted assassination on President Truman, campus policemen have been attending World In Crisis lecturers . . . but we think they're guarding the wrong spot, for a student was seen a few days ago walking out of Green hall with two shot-guns under his arm. Hm, shotguns—isn't that a noun used to designate a weapon which teachers use on students?
Whoever selects the repertoire of records for the Union fountain evidently ignores the type of student who sips a quick cup of coffee while cramming for a quiz . . . or perhaps the selector is a psychologist who thinks jazz and be-bop will create an attitude of alertness among the listeners.
Several coeds questioned by the National Youth Panel reported they want men with "PAM." PAM is a combination of personality, appearance, and manners. The coeds ruled that the ideal man should be able to talk on any subject, have his career planned, and be very attractive. And we ask, is that all?
After counting the apple crop, the government reports there will be 156 apples for every man, woman, and child—but the doctors are going to the army, anyway.—Wichita Eagle.
Student Tells About Nazi Training
By MARVIN ARTH
Rudi Hofmann fell into a burning mass of exploded shells in the Battle of the Bulge. His hands were burned badly in the fall and today the skin on the insides of his hands is practically smooth.
Hofmann, a 21-year old German exchange student, was in a dispatch unit with the Hohenstaufen division of the S.S. when the accident occurred in December, 1944. In 1941, he had been selected with 12,000 other German youth to attend the select Adolf Hitler School in Southfen in the Alps. A year later he was transferred to another Adolf Hitler school at Vogelsang, 20 miles from the Belgian border in western Germany.
The curricula at the two exclusive schools included mathematics, English, German, history, biology, chemistry, and music. All these courses were slanted to Nazi beliefs, and contained a good deal of untruth.
Hitter and other leaders of the Third Reich visited these schools once a year. The young Nazi leaders had to learn all the officials' names and the history of the Nazi party. They had to read Hitler's Mein Kampf, but Rudi believes that none of them understood it very well.
Near the end of the war, the students were rushed through their schools to provide needed manpower, and Rudi became a member of the S.S. at 16. It was at this time he had the accident in the Battle of the Bulge.
The boys were given excellent food, at least in comparison to what others were eating. They were allowed to listen to English and French broadcasts and to read newspapers from other countries. A death penalty was given other Germans who did these things. Of course, the listening was supervised and the youth were told just what parts of the foreign reports they could believe and what parts were propaganda.
The youths were permitted to visit their families once a year, but theoretically they belonged to the state. Instead of taking a vacation from school in the summer, they would work in coal mines, factories, and farms to learn how the hoi polloi of Germany lived, and to understand operation of the industries.
The boys were subjected to a rigi military and physical exercise schedule, but were allowed to participate in such sports as tennis, fencing, basketball, swimming, track and field, and handball.
Hofmann explained that "swastika" was an American word and that he had never heard it until after the war. The emblem, which all the boys in the Hitler schools wore on their black and brown uniforms, was known to them as "haken krenz" or crooked cross.
Minor Wants Beer
Dear Editor:
"No Schlitz," said the waiter, much to my surprise. It seems there is a city ordinance against selling beer on election day. City ordinances are wonderful things. They are an institution, a tradition-like the five-cent ice cream cone.
Being rather thirsty Tuesday night, I stopped by the Jayhawk cafe to have a beer.
If town fathers wish to prevent the voters from drinking on election day, that is indeed their privilege and duty—but what about us minors who are too young to vote? I cannot think of anything more pathetic than a dry minor on election day. An amendment should be added to that city ordinance stating, "Beer may be sold to all minors on election day provided they can prove their age."
Gene Goltz College Freshman
Editor's Note: The excuse for printing this letter certainly does not lie in the Kansan's policy of promoting worthy causes, but rather in its attempt to allow freedom of expression.
-Kansan Photo By Ed Chapin
RUDI HOFMANN, German exchange student, shows Marvin Arth, Kansan reporter, the locality of the Hitler school which he attended before becoming a member of the S.S. troops.
"I didn't even know that there were concentration camps in Germany, although Buchenwald was only 50 miles north of my home. It was not until after the war that I found out about them," Hofmann said.
He said that people of the Jewish religion whom he knew would disappear, but everyone thought they were leaving the country, not realizing they were being murdered.
Rudi said that he knew of Dachen, but thought it was merely a prison. As to the purging of the Jews by Hitler, he knew of course that there was a vigorous hate campaign to make all the Germans dissatisfied with the Jewish religion and their way of life, but he did not realize what the Nazi leaders were doing to the Jews.
The predominant religions in Germany are Catholic and Lutheran, but Hitler discouraged people from going to church.
Rudi's home, Mellrichstadt in Bavaria, Ga., is two miles from the Russian zone. The past spring, one of Rudi's brothers came home, after having been imprisoned for five years in Russia.
"He was a physical and mental wreck and violently anti-Communist," Rudi said of his brother. "He would eat things raw and seemed to have lost his sense of culture. He didn't want to talk of his five years in the Russian slave camp."
Hofmann is attending the University as an exchange student for one year under a United States army exchange program. Before coming to K.U., he attended the University of Munich, where he majored in journalism. A special student in journalism at K.U., Rudi said, "at Munich, we are taught merely the academic principles of journalism, but at K.U, we actually put out a paper. I had never seen how a paper really works until this fall."
Recreation In Colleges Is Topic At Convention
Joan Harris, education senior, led discussion on problems in recreation in colleges at the Kansas Athletic Federation of College Women's convention held Nov. 3 and 4 in Wichita.
Miss Harris; Patsy Landis, education junior; Mary Ann Mahoney, education freshman; and Miss Martha Trate, instructor in physical education, also attended the convention as delegates of the Women's Athletic association
you'll cut quite a figure, too—if you use your head—and "Live-Acute" Vitalis care. Give that mop on top the famous "60-second workout." 50 seconds scalp massage (see the difference). . . 10 seconds to comb (and will the winnim see the difference). You'll look neat 'n natural. Bye-bye loose, flaky dandruff and dryness, too. So latch on to Vitalis—see the man at the drug store or barber shop pronto.
LIVE ACTION
A PRODUCT OF BRISTOL-MYERS
VITALIS and the 60-Second Workout