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University Daily Kansan Monday. Dec. 1, 1958
The Andrews Case
Once in a great while, a society or a fragment of society must look upon itself and ask what it could have done to prevent tragedy. That time came for the University Friday, when Lowell Lee Andrews shot and killed his family.
The motives and thoughts that brought Andrews to murder will never be completely known. Even mental probing by psychiatrists will not bring out the whole truth about what happened in the Bethel home Friday night. Andrews himself probably does not know why he killed.
Murder lies deep in the primitive part of every man's mind. For most of us, it never comes to the surface. What finger touched Andrews' brain and drove him to murder?
Was it the continued strain of being trapped between economics and ambition? Was it a pressure of society that made education more valuable than three lives? Was murder only the violent act of an emotional cripple?
We have no way of knowing. But this we do
know: Andrews is a part of all of us. Whether or not we, as members of society, accept guilt along with Andrews, we must own that he is one of us.
We have all sometimes felt there was no way out, that our problem had no solution, that we were trapped in a world beyond hope. Yet we did not kill. What draws the line that divides us, that says this man shall kill while this one shall not? This, too, we do not know. But the thinness of that line we have learned from Lowell Andrews.
If these murders bring any of us to a better realization or a more accurate perspective toward our own problems, there will be some mitigation of the guilt which Andrews bears. That is not optimism, but fact.
We are all one with Lowell Andrews, and his guilt must rest, however lightly, on all of us. We produced him, and we must shoulder what he has done. —Alan Jones
The Good Old Days
Editor:
The headline "ASC Hauled Off To Jail in 1914" in the Nov. 21 Kansas attracted my attention because in 1914 there was no ASC. Nor for a long time after that. There was, as the quote in the story shows, a Men's Student Council. Perhaps the fact that it was made up of men elected by men explains why it behaved like the TNE of these days. TNE at that time drowned its sorrows so thoroughly that it did not try to paint the town. Such is progress.
(Adams street of the story because the same pavement then as now.)
J. Neale Carman Professor of Romance languages
ASC and Politics
In reference to Mr. Husar's editorial commending the ASC for deciding not to appoint a racial investigating committee, I should like to take exception to the philosophy of the editorial. This philosophy is that "politics" is a neatly bundled group of activities apart from any other aspects of living... some sort of stylized game, played in abstract terms to obtain certain abstract goals.
Edifor:
This attitude, although sometimes—perhaps always—popular, is one that does not square very well with the American concept of democratic government. I would judge the American concept to be that "politics" is the way the people solve their own problems, the method the people have of running their own business.
There is scarcely cause for rejoicing when a political agency washes its hands of a social problem or passes it along to a nonpolitical agency. If it is a social problem, it would seem the best agency to assist in its solution would be an agency created for the express purpose of working toward solutions of the problems of that society.
Casting back over the history of democratic progress, I am unable to recall an instance where social progress toward a democratic goal was accomplished "without the hindrance of publicity" "under the veil of quietude." While an occasional subversion has been accomplished by this means, most of the examples I can recall of progress have been possible only through the help of such agents of publicity as speech, assembly, and the press. I would appreciate it if Mr. Husar could reassure me with a few examples of underground progress toward public democracy.
Duane Postlethwaite Route 4, Lawrence
Real Blarney
Editor:
I was amazed by the atmosphere of constant siege in our sororities uncovered by Miss Mary Alden in her editorial "Keep Them Out." (Kansan, Nov. 24.) Does she recommend the girls on campus follow the practices of our Victorian maiden aunts, and roll a rubber ball under the bed every night before going to bed? (If it does not roll freely, you scream or activate the fire alarm!)
One would think that in view of the physical toughness of girls today, it would be the male student prowler in a sorority who would be in danger.
What we urgently need instead, in a country where women begin to be possessive in grade school, where these women are already dominant in religious, financial, and social affairs, and where the women are generally the aggressive sex, is a word of warning to the male student against the solitary (unweed), female prowler.
Denis Kennedy Dublin, Ireland graduate student
To be eligible for loans from the University Fund, students must have completed one semester at KU with a "C" grade average and must be enrolled at the time of the loan.
LITTLE MAN ON CAMPUS BY BIBLER
SHE'D MAKE YA SWELL BLIND DATE. ASK WORTHAL I FIXED HIM LIP WITH HER EARLIER THIS EVENING.
Founded 1889, became biweekly 1904,
trickle week 1908, daily Jan. 16, 1912.
Dailu Hansan
University of Kansas student newspaper
Telephone VIkling 3-2700 Extension 711, news room Extension 376, business office
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Associated Collegiate Press. Repres-
ented by National Advertising Service,
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USA. Member of the United Press Inta-
ternational. Mail subscription rates: $3
semester or $4.50 a year. Published in
Lawrence, Kan., every afternoon
during the University year except
Saturday mornings and examination periods.
Entered as second-class matter Sept. 17,
1910, at Lawrence, Kan. post office
under act of March 3, 1879.
Malcolm Applegate ... Managing Editor
Leroy Lory, Pat, Mat Swantha, Marathon
Crosier, Doug, Parker, Assistant
Mary Crosier, Assistant
City Editor; Jeanne Arnold, Society
Editor; Sandra Hayn, Assistant
Society Editor; Bob Macy, Telegraph
Editor; Chris Gillis, Graph Editor; Jim Cable, Sports Editor;
Don Culp, Athletic Sports Editor.
NEWS DEPARTMENT
BUSINESS DEPARTMENT
Bill Irvine ... Business Manager
William Feitz, Advertising Manager;
Robert Lida, Classified Advertising Manager; William Kane, Circulation Manager; Maurice Nicklin, Promotion Manager; Maurice Nicklin, National Advertising Manager.
EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT
Al Jones ... Editorial Editor
John Husar, Associate Editorial Editor.
Allen - Len↑z
By Jon Rutherford
MAN'S WORLD OF SOUND, John R. Pierce and Edward E. David Jr. Doubleday and Co., $5.00.
This is a book intended for the layman and scientist alike, as a guide to an understanding of some parts of "the new physics and physiology of speech and hearing." It must be said that the book shows a seemingly unavoidable weakness common to books aimed at such a diverse audience; some of it is too complex for the layman, and much is too simple to interest the trained worker. However, this is the only serious flaw, and it can be overlooked in consideration of the many excellent qualities the work possesses.
To at least one layman, this book is really absorbing. It achieves its high interest level through many devices. There are, for example, many similes employed to make certain points stand out clearly in the lay mind. Sound waves are compared to wave motion in a field of grain. "White noise," so called because it is composed of "all frequencies equally," as white light is, is made imaginable by the simple means of blowing edgewise on a sheet of paper, thus producing a complex sound much like white, or Gaussian, noise.
Another thing that makes "Man's World of Sound" so readable is its intensely humanistic approach. It is startling to find a book concerned with mechanical and electronic speaking devices, hi fi, statistical analyses, and the newer findings of acoustical science, and yet discover in it an almost worshipful attitude toward the human creature himself. (This attitude is supposed nowadays to be implicit in all respectable scientists, but it is reassuring to find it explicit once in a while.)
The findings the authors discuss in this apparently unique treatment can leave no doubt in even the most misanthropic that man is not to be taken too lightly. Especially stunning is the revelation (again, to a layman) that the range of audible sounds man can perceive has not even been measured yet to any degree of certainty. The authors remark on some fairly everyday sounds ranging from a ten-decibel rustle of leaves to "hammering on a steel plate two feet away," at a less pleasant 115 decibels. They add, "This range of sounds... covers a range of power of over ten billion times. The total range of audible sound...is some hundred to thousand times greater."
When one comes away from a study and pondering of the material these two Bell Telephone scientists have presented, he must feel a deep respect for the sense of hearing, perhaps our most acute and certainly one of the most intriguing. And unless the reader is well versed in the field he can not help being astounded by some of the things he never knew about, such as long-distance telephony, which is also discussed in the book.
Those especially interested in this well illustrated volume will include serious hi-fi fans (although emphatically this is not a book slanted for that market), teachers and advanced students of speech and language, those wishing to dip into communication theory, and that class of readers who like books chock-full of fascinating information relevant to man's probe into the physical and physiological world.
The work's chief fault is that it tries to say too much; its big virtue, and one which seems easily to outweigh the flaws, is that it can create for large segments of the public a new respect not only for scientific research but also for the human being himself.
It Looks This Way ...
By John Husar
Only three weeks until Christmas vacation, and we can't wait.
Only three weeks until Christmas vacation, and we care It was great to have a whole week away from the books and the mountainous paths of this campus. We enjoyed the break so much we forgot our resolutions to study hard and simply collapsed into an oblivious state. Now we need another vacation to catch up on the studies we promised would be completed by now. Only three weeks. Hmmm.
Enough entertainment should fill our time while we wait for the Christmas season. Tonight KU plays Rice in the first game of the basketball season. Students should take advantage of the basketball games. Good, cheap dates.
Homer Floyd made everybody's All-Big Eight Team. A good honor for one of KU's greatest football players. But it wasn't adequate. Homer is probably one of the most overlooked players in today's game. Holder of the second spot among KU's all-time leading ground-gainers, Homer also excelled on defense with many games-saving tackles. In fact, there hardly was a victory that Homer didn't have a big hand in saving during the past three years. As one of football's most valuable and colorful players, Homer deserves a place on any All America team. It is a shame he was overlooked.
Traditionally, more parties will be crammed into these three weeks than any other time of year. Every house will have some kind of function, plus the usual pre-Christmas rush. Individuals and groups will constantly have private parties, and will attend those sponsored by the local hostelries. Some wastrels will try to study, not knowing what Christmas vacation is for.
Our assistant society editor asks us to warn the readers of the horrible headaches that can be gotten from too-frequent application of scotch and water to the stomach. Which reminds us of Thanksgiving vacation. All should be rested by now and eager to jump back onto the treadmill of university life. Those who don't quite feel that way can always cradle their heads like the society department, and wait just three more weeks.