Recalls Thanksgiving, 1620
'Turkey day' almost lost
By JOHN LOVEKIN
By JOHN LOVERKIN
The great gobble day will soon be here. With heaps of mashed potatoes and slices of turkey, Americans will give some kind of thanks for their blessings, between mouthfuls.
For some Americans, Thanksgiving will mean a brief respite from 7:30 and 8:30 a.m. classes. For others, it will mean a good ten hours of sleep. And for others, it will mean a bellyache.
But in the current times, it takes some real effort to stop for a moment and remember what Thanksgiving is all about, or was all about.
NO SOONER IS the "great pumpkin" thrown in the garbage can than someone starts singing "Jingle Bells," and stringing ropes
of thafoil across the city streets, with some kind of Santa Claus hanging from every telephone pole.
So somehow, Thanksgiving has gotten lost in the mad dash from pumpkin greeting cards and Dracula costumes to the economic Mecca of Christmas.
When the gobble day finally arrives, someone may hear the low mourning of an old pilgrim ghost sitting atop Plymouth Rock, wondering what all the madness is about.
While trying to understand the new times, he may recall his own Thanksgiving, some 350 years ago. He will probably remember the nine tossing weeks it took to cross the Atlantic Ocean, and
then finally reaching the desolate shores of Cape Cod.
AND THEN HE may remember the long cold bitter winter, with savages on the prowl outside, while hunger and disease raged inside his small stockade.
At last spring came, and then summer, and with the help of a friendly Indian, the pilgrim learned how to plant corn, and where to catch fish. After many months, he finally had enough food stored up for the coming winter.
And just as winter was ready to strike, the pilgrims gathered around some simple wooden tables, and mindful that there would be enough food, and they were not all dead, they give their Thanksgiving.
77th Year, No.46
LAWRENCE, KANSAS
Monday, November 21, 1966
Staff photo by Lynniel Q. VanBenschoten
OVER THE RIVER AND THROUGH THE WOODS . . .
"Left, right, left, right—to Grandmother's house we go." Carol Perkins, Fort Worth, Texas, sophomore, marches Tom to the table.
'Downs' given as warning only
By GARY MURRELL
KU's Dean of Students doesn't think down slips mean very much and believes there are merely friendly warnings of low grades.
Dean Laurence C. Woodruff, who also teaches a biology lecture section, said he sends "downs" out only when a student is making what he terms unsatisfactory progress.
"I WOULDN'T WORRY about 'downs' if it weren't University policy to send them out," he said.
Down slips are recommended when freshmen and sophomores are making grades of "D." "F" or "FF" at the end of the first six weeks of a semester in courses numbering 50 or below.
Dean Woodruff said any instructor may send them to any student if he feels the student is not progressing even though he might be doing "C" work.
"MOST UPPERCLASS professors feel a student knows how well he is doing in a class," he said. "Why bother to notify his parents when it isn't their responsibility."
"By the time students reach a junior classification, they should be left alone to work without being taunted with poor grade reports."
Dean Woodruff said he is a more rigid grader at six week periods than at semester.
"In past years, some living groups such as fraternities and sororites have kept such records, but since it is not a part of a student's permanent record, I see no reason for it and thus we don't have such information."
NO LISTS of students having down hours are kept by University offices, he said.
- "They really don't mean very much." Dean Woodruff said. "Most instructors usually base them on one test only.
USUALLY, KU CARRIES about 3,000 hours of unsatisfactory work for nearly 15.000 students at six weeks into a semester. This averages about 20 hours a student.
This semester, however, about 3,500 hours of "down" were recorded for 14,800 students—an average of 24 hours per student.
Mailing of the reports are handled by the University's seven schools, including the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.
Minuteman article accuses a local man
By DAN AUSTIN
Last week three members of the right-wing, para military Minutemen organization were found guilty of illegal possession of firearms—a .50 calibre machine gun, among others—in a Kansas City federal court.
And according to the June issue of "On Target," a Minuteman publication, a former KU student might be responsible for the "guilty" verdict.
The former student is Laird Wilcox, a Lawrence resident and editor of the liberal Kansas Free Press (KFP).
THE ARTICLE in 'On Target," written by Cindy Melville, personal secretary to Robert B. DePugh, national coordinator of the Minutemen, is her account
Following Miss Melville's article is another one by Fred Miller titled "The Great Ammunition mystery."
- * * *
Student basketball tickets will go on sale for the final day Tuesday. Nov. 29.
Referring to a column written by Wilcox in the January KFP about the arrest of Minuteman Walter Peyson for possession of a machine gun and 900 rounds of ammunition. Miller states that the figure "900" was not public knowledge.
cf an interrogation by Judd Doyle, agent for the Alcohol, Tobacco Tax (ATT) division of the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, on April 22, 1966.
English Proficiency Exam results should be ready for publication shortly after Thanksgiving Vacation, the Western Civilization department, which heads the program, said today.
In the story, Miss Melville said that Agent Doyle, when asked for his name, wrote it on the back of a Free Press business card used by Wilcox.
During the three day selling period last week, 6,500 student basketball tickets were sold.
"ANYWAY YOU look at it there is a suspiciously close connection between Revenuer Judd Doyle and lefty Laird Wilcox," Miller wrote.
Wilcox agrees.
"Every ATT agent in Kansas City carries one of my business cards in case they need to contact me for information about Minutemen activities in Kansas," says Wilcox.
However, Wilcox says that Agent Judd probably gave Miss Melville his card by mistake.
And that "900" rounds of machine gun ammunition?
"I DID HAVE inside information about the 900 rounds of
tracer ammunition found with Wally Peyson's .50 calibre machine gun," Wilcox says, "but I'd rather not say how I acquired it—it would endanger my relationships with Minuteman informants."
A footnote in the "On Target" issue refers to Wilcox as a "professional student" at KU living "affluently on a small income... derived by soliciting subscriptions to communist newspapers and various left-wing magazines."
Previously, in 1964 Minuteman leader DePugh had called Wilcox a "professional leftist agitator"
(Continued on page 3)
WEATHER
The United States Weather Bureau predicts cloudy and rather mild tonight and tomorrow.
A night time low of 40 degrees today and a cooler trend for tomorrow night is predicted. There is a five per cent probability of precipitation through tomorrow.
Local pollution control needed—see page 10