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The Red and Black
Monday. November 10, I9HI
Brumby Hall gets smoke alarms
By ANN DEACON
Krd and Black Staff WrUrr
Installation of an early warning
smoke detection system is nearly
completed in Brumby Hall,
according to Dan Hallenbeck,
director of University housing
"We have installed the conduits for
the smoke detection system all the
way from the ninth floor down to the
second floor of Brumby Once the
conduit is in, the system can be
wired," Hallenbeck said.
He said that installation in the
other two high-rise dorms, Russell
and Creswell Halls, will begin as soon
as it is completed in Brumby. He did
not know, however, if the smoke and
thermal units would be installed in
the other two dorms before the entire
system was actually hooked up and
in operation.
The photo-electric system consists
of a beam of light, which, when
broken by smoke triggers the alarm
This alarm automatically sets off the
regular fire alarm in the buildings.
Fire doors for the three dorms
have already arrived, but the
housing department has postponed
installation until special-order locks
for the doors come in, said Bob Huss,
assistant director of housing The
scheduled delivery date for the locks
is Dec 10. “We will install the doors
immediately after the locks arrive,"
he said.
The fire doors are "B" labeled,
w hich means that they will contain a
raging fire for approximately an
hour and a half. Hallenbeck said
This summer the metal louvers
above doors in Brumby and Russell
were covered with metal and the
doors were undercut inch to allow
for ventilation, he said The louvers
in Creswell w ere not covered because
it is not air-conditioned and the vents
are needed for air circulation. Public
Safety also painted fire lanes in all
dorm parking lots this summer, and
an emergency lighting system was
installed in Creswell
Hallenbeck said there is no need
for concern about fire safety in the
high-rise dorms. All buildings have
valid evacuation plans and fire alert
systems, he said
The improvements in fire safety
are funded through an allocation of
$390,000 approved by the Board of
Regents last April
Birnbach takes credit for prep phenomenon
Klvena Green displays Bugs Bunney cel
Staff photo/\|it/i Harris
(CPS) — Lisa Birnbach,
editor of "The Official
Preppy Handbook." happily
takes credit for the preppy
fad now enjoying its second
year of supremecy on
campus.
Since her witty guide to the
mores of the rich and casual
appeared in October. 1980, it
has become not only a
bestseller, but a force
moving style-conscious
students to buy Lacoste
alligator shirts (preferably
pink this year), khaki pants,
Sperry Topsiders shoes and
anything from the "prep
mecca:" The L.L. Bean
catalogue.
Now a year old, the
Handbook has sold a
phenomenal 1,193,000 copies,
is in its 22nd printing and has
spawned Canadian and
Japanense editions
More is coming Workman
Publishing, which produced
the Handbook, is offering
preppy desk diaries and the
like to help separate the
“key" people from the nerds
andwonks.
But, oddly enough, under
the Fair Island sweater,
penny loafers, argyle knee
socks and camel corduroy
blazer is a different Lisa
Birnbach: A very serious,
25-year-old liberal Jewish
Democrat from New York
who is mostly amused by the
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preppy phenomenon
"People still ask me Was
it a joke? Was it supposed to
be serious?'" Birnbach said
"I still can't believe that it’s
that hard to figure out
There's a difference between
you preppies are ridiculous'
and 'us preppies are
ridiculous.' That’s what we
were trying to do."
"I don't like it when people
want to restrict other people
from something. I want
everybody to be preppy
So despite all the frivolity
she has helped promote, she
is concerned about the
student audiences she
speaks to almost constantly.
"When students want me
to see how preppy they are,
they show me their Reagan-
Bush stickers. That doesn't
make me happy at all. I'm
political and I’ve always
been political, but I
recognize that they didn't
invite me to be Lisa
Birnbach. They invited me
to talk about prep. "
Some of the time her views
lead out anyway. At Duke,
she couldn't resist speaking
out against the Nixon library
proposed for the campus
"Students aren't political
at all. I'm worried that they
aren't getting enough out of
their education. When I'm up
there I'm not trying to say.
Let's all throw up together'
There is more to college than
that I hope that most of
them know that all of this is
just in fun, "she said.
Birnbach does realize that
some do take it seriously,
perhaps as a symbol of
personal caution.
“I wish something else
(other than prepl had
become a symbol of playing
it safe, but preppy isn't
incompatable with that
mood,” she said. "If the only
choices you have are to
major in business or art
history, one way to play it
safe its to dress preppy.' ’
It has also become a badge
of identity. "In the sixties
you knew that anyone who
had short hair was a fascist
and voted for Nixon and
anybody who had long hair
was okay. Now you can have
long hair and be a fascist,"
she said.
The alternative is to dress
preppy. Birnbach said. It is
"instant respectability. I
mean, you're always
dressed for a job interview."
she said.
Birnbach is not without
her own prep school
credentials Daughter of a
gem importer and a writer,
Birnbach went to
Manhattan's Lennox School,
Riverdale Country School,
Barnard College and Brown
University, graduating in
1978 with an English degree
It was at Brown when
Birnbach and classmate
Jonathan Roberts started
keeping notebooks of the
foibles of their fellow
students, usually those of the
upper classes.
"We even had a list of
preppy diseases," she said.
“There was a lot of things
that didn't make it into the
book.”
Sadly for pop culture
historians, the notebooks
were lost, and Birnbach and
company had to start from
scratch when Roberts
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proposed to Workman
Publishing to "do a book on
preppies." The publishing
house was initially
uninterested, but in Spring,
1980, when designer Ralph
Lauren produced a line of
preppy clothing, Workman
changed its mind.
Roberts convinced
Birnbach to edit the book
because Roberts, a
Workman staffer, was busy
with other projects. They
assembled it in five months
Birnbach "really thought
the book would die in a few
months after it came out,”
when students waded into
the school year. "College
students don't spend much
time in the book stores after
they buy their (text) books,”
she said
Instead, the handbook took
off, and Birnbach has been
touring colleges ever since.
Her first tour took her to
the West and South,
including Hampden-Sydney
College in Virginia, which
she dubs "The preppiest
college in the country. ”
"Other than Gordon
Liddy, I think I’m hitting the
college lecture circuit the
hardest," she said.
On the circuit, she plays
her high priestess of prep
role to the hilt, wearing Top
Drawer regalia and
presiding over any kind of
pro-preppy event the
sponsors concoct.
At the University of
Southern California, she
judged a Who's Most Preppy
Contest. Some entrants
brought golf carts and
standing closets full of The
Right Clothes.
Generally she does a 90-
minute stand-up comedy
routine and then answers
audience questions. Topics
range from prep sex (“a
contradiction in terms”) to
drinking. She encourages
students to "wear beer."
"Beer is not only a
beverage, but a fashion
accessory," she said.
The ulitmate in drinking
acceptance is performing
■the "technicolor yawn" —
throwing up in public.
“There really can't be a
sequel (to the book) as
such." she said with a laugh.
"We say that nothing's
changed since 1635, so there
isn't anything different.’’
She sells celluloids
By STEPHEN GENOVESI
Krd jihI k Staff Writer
Have you been searching for a special
something to put on that bare wall at home?
Something that is unusual and one of a kind?
Well, search no more. Elvena Green and her
collection of eels may be just what you need
A cel, short for celluloid, is the final piece
of art work of an animated film before it
reaches the camera. It takes thousands of
individual cels to make up a cartoon
Green, a retired professor from the Agnes
Scott Drama Department, is not only a
collector but is also a dealer of cels
Green calls her works of cartoon art "one
of a kind” and sold them at Georgia Square
over the weekend Her established
dealership is at her home in Decatur.
“One cel occupies two frames, and 24
frames occupy one second on the screen."
Green explained. "Therefore, it takes
approximately 7,000 cels to make a 10-minute
cartoon."
The cels are not only decorative types of
art, hut they can be very valuable. Such is
the ease with most Walt Disney cels
Disney's "Snow White and the Seven
Dwarfs" was the first animated film whose
cels were officially sold to collectors and
preserved.
Cels in Green's collection are priced from
$3 all they way up to $1,200 for one Snow
White cel
“All the cels that have backgri jnds are
valuable works of art and are worth the
investment," Green said
“I'm always being contacted by anxious
collectors who are looking for a certain
character, with a certain setting and in a
certain animation," she said.
Green's selections include Disney cels,
Hanna-Barbera cels (Yogi Bean, Warner
Brothers (Bugs Bunny), Lantz (Woody
Woodpecker i, and Melendez (Peanuts)
Older eels are made of nitrate and thus are
delicate and highly flammable. Green said
Cels made since 1941 are made of acetate and
ale not considered dangerous to store
Green started collecting cels in 1978. She
had heard from an agent that there were
large varieties of Hanna-Barbera cels
available in California She took the risk of
buying them and in two months she had 2,000
Today, she has more than 1,000.
Preppy handbook starts
‘merchandizing bonanza’
(CPS) — Lisa Birnbach's "little madras
book," "The Official Preppy Handbook," has
touched off a major merchandising bonanza
as well as a fad.
Now in its 22nd printing, the preppy
handbook has thus far sold over a million
paperback copies, at $4.95 each, and a hard
cover Christmas "collector's edition."
priced at $9.95 each, is on its way
The book forms just the wheels, though, of
a commercial bandwagon upon which
numerous exploiters have been quick to hop
Workman Press of New York, which
publishes the book (and the Kliban Cat
books) also produces an astounding array of
related preppy products
“The preppy book,” said Donna Gould,
Workman's publicity director, "has
parented preppy products." Indeed. Preppy
tote bags and T-shirts abound, as do aprons
("Before truth," extolls one, "the right
fork"), desk diaries, Christmas cards,
stationary, book bags, note pads (messages
from the desks of "Mummy," "Daddy,”
"Muffy" or "Skip”) and pins ("C.B.C" —
Couldn't Be Cuter — for one.)
Corky Tyler, national sales manager for
Sigma Marketing Inc., a large distributor of
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preppy ceramic pieces and glassware, is less
sanguine Although enthusiastic about her
company's preppy products, she says they
have not done well iiulmdtmr the Northeast.
Southeast or southern California
"It hasn't caught on in places like
Wyoming or the Dakotas, but this is not due
to resistance to the product, but to a lack of
interest," she said.
If those regions do not need preppy, it is
clear that preppy does not need them either.
One firm, the C.R Gibson Co., has already
sold "in excess off" $750,000 worth of preppy
scapbooks, photo albums, address books,
bulletin boards, mini jigsaw puzzles and
other printed material just since May.
No dream goes unopposed, however, and
opposition is exploitable, too
Bloomingdale's and Macy s in New York
have both opened special preppy shops,
which feature preppy- and anti-preppy
material side-by-side "The 1 Hate Preppies
Handbook," in particular, is reported by
Macy's to be “doing very well."
The phenomenon has even proved itself lo
be exportable: Preppy products have been
licensed in Japan this year.
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