Camper's Forum
(Editor's Note: The following editorials were written by Midwestern Music and Art Campers in the journalism division.)
Pollution by noise
The scene is a house in suburbia. Sidewalks are being repaired as an ambulance shrieks to its destination. The wife has just set the dishwasher going and turns to grind up the garbage in the disposal. Her teenage daughter is listening to the radio as the children watch cartoons on T.V. Pollution, here? Yes. Noise pollution.
The average city noise level is rising at the rate of one decibel a year. Sound at 140 decibels or above can cause a hearing loss.
Continuous noise above 85 decibels produces the same effects. Ordinary conversation is measured at 60 decibels; a power mower registers 107; a jet taking off, 150.
As more and more noise-producing equipment is used in and around our homes the more the danger mounts. The noise strikes quickly. There are no warning coughs or dead fish washed ashore.
Will we take adequate action before it's too late? In a few years no one will care anymore. Think about it. That is, while we can still hear ourselves think.
—Duayne Draffen
Underground papers
There has been a recent surge of "underground publications" on our college and high school campuses.
Can the accepted newspapers learn to live alongside our new editions that so threaten the existence of established journals?
Students often become "turned off" with the normal jargon that is printed by school newspapers. This is extremely so with the high school newspapers. In these publications you are constantly reading about award ceremonies, sports activities, gossip, teachers likes and dislikes, etc.
Many of our students have come to realize the uselessness of such information, and have taken it upon themselves to build a worthwhile publication that more students can benefit from. I have to confess that a large portion of these attempts have not succeeded in fulfilling their goals. However, the effect of their endeavors has proved to be more effective than what meets the eye.
The monotonous newspaper has seen the possibilities of writing articles that concern more than the narrow-minded student. Our news editors have taken the initiative to steer their reporters and feature writers' ability to issues that involve both the student and the world outside the schoolyard fence.
Competition grows between the founders of underground papers and staffs of the school paper. In a specific instance, the leaders who felt the yearning for a new voice in school found just that. The established edition realized its mistakes, found its faults, and saw what it lacked. The paper started from scratch. New policies were formulated, the staff was revamped to represent the student body, and the paper itself was renamed. It established a new face and outlook.
In the above instance the people who were out to seek a new means of expression discovered they could utilize the immediately available medium, the school paper. Through this publication, young writers, philosophers and politicians were able to express themselves.
An official school newspaper must adapt to new student bodies and create new policies. It should not wrap itself around tradition. A school edition has to serve its readership, not its sponsors. When the above is true, the need for new publications will not be necessary.
—Leonard Sophrin
Capital punishment
Several cases are before the United States Supreme Court currently, questioning the constitutionality of capital punishment The rulings on the cases probably will not come for at least six months, allowing the hundreds of condemned men in U.S. prisons to wait for the ruling on their fate.
It seems, however, that not even a majority of the American people support the abolishment of the death penalty. The most frequently heard argument against abolishment is the deterrent effect of executions on crime. Supposedly, if we do away with the death penalty in this country completely, murders will fantastically increase.
This, however, has proven not to be true.
Fourteen states already have banned executions, with no apparent disastrous effects. The average murder rates (murders per 100,000 population) of those states combined is 3.5. This figure compares with the 5.6 rate for the entire country and 6.4 rate for just those 36 states still having the death penalty.
Thus, it would appear that dropping the death penalty lessens the murder rate in that state.
From a purely moral point of view, the death penalty is wrong. More importantly to some people, though, executions are not serving their stated purpose, constitutional or unconstitutional.
—Kurt Andersen
Sorel's News Service
Another Better Idea From Ford
DETROIT—Reacting to public concern about air pollution, Henry Ford II recently gave his assessment of the situation: "We have tremendous investment in facilities for engines, transmissions, and axles, and I can't see throwing these away just because the electric car doesn't emit fumes."
Forger had master's touch
Not all the money was profit.
In order to get old linen, he used paintings of lesser known 17th century painters. A lot of money also went into the buying of special paints.
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (UPI)—When Hans van Meegeren was arrested after the end of the Nazi occupation of Holland and charged with selling old masters to Germany his defense provoked widespread disbelief.
He said the paintings he sold-certified by experts as genuine masterpieces by the 17th century Dutch masters Johannes Vermeer and Pieter de Hoochs—were fakes that he had painted himself.
Van Meegeren produced his fakes in his atelier at Rocquebrune on the French Riviera.
He added another sensation. He was, he said, the man who painted "The Men of Emmaus," another verified masterpiece by Vermeer "discovered" in Holland a few years before the war, bought for 550,000 guilders (then $292,000) by the Dutch Rembrandt Society and the subject of international interest at a special exhibition.
The art world of 1945—this is the 25th anniversary year of van Meegeren's arrest—was stunned by the revelations that emerged from his prison cell. He said he had begun his career of art forgery because he had failed to find recognition under his own name and wanted to show he was the equal of the old masters.
He managed to get the "cra-
Still unconvinced, the art experts demanded proof. Officials in charge of the investigation allowed van Meegeren to return to his mansion on one of the Amsterdam canals to paint a "Vermeer" under the eyes of six witnesses sworn in by the court. Two months later van Meegeren put the finishing touch to "Jesus In the Temple" so much in the style of Vermeer that it convinced the watchers he could really have painted the two "Vermeers" and two "Pieter de Hoochs" he sold.
The investigation showed the eight paintings netted a total of 7,159,000 guilders ($3.8 million at the pre-war exchange rate). After paying off middlemen, van Meegeren still had 5,180,000 guilders (then $2.7 million).
quelure" (cracks) on his own paintings by wringing and bending them while they were heated.
When the trial started before the Amsterdam court, the charge was changed from export of old masters to swindling or falsely signing of works of art.
Next to van Meegeren, the limelight fell on Dr. P. B. Coremans of Belgium. As prewari director of the central laboratories of the Belgian state museums, he had expressed doubts about the authenticity of "The Men of Emmaus."
BOOKS
A HOUSE IN THE UPLANDS,
by Erskeil Caldwell (Gold Medal,
75 cents)—Another earth novel of
the southern back country by
Caldwell, this one dating to 1946.
The curious thing is that the sex
and violence of Caldwell now
seem as old-fashioned as Louisa
May Alcott.
THE MANHUNTER, by Gordon D. Shirreffs (Gold Medal, 60 cents); SHADOW ON THE TRAIL, by Zane Grey (Pocket, 60 cents—Two for the western fan. Zane Grey's came out in the forties, and is in the old-fashioned style of Grey, while "The Manhunter" is more in the adult western pattern of recent years.
Coremans, as chairman of the court appointed committee of experts, explained in detail how the committee concluded van Meegeren was right in claiming he faked them all.
At the trial, van Meegeren paid Coremans his compliment "Your work is excellent. It is phenomenal. Due to your method of investigation, falsification of paintings in the future will become impossible. What you did, was even smarter than painting the Men of Emmaus."
He also said the signatures were the most difficult of the fakes since they had to be right at the first effort.
He said he had worked for five years on his process. "It took hold of me in such a way I had to go on after the Men of Emmaus. And I had to ask high prices since otherwise the paintings would have been judged false immediately."
The court sentenced him to one year in prison. But soon after the trial, van Meegeren became ill and was taken to a mental hospital, where he died two months later, aged 58.
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