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THE MAROON TIGER
Page 5
SPELMAN COLLEGE CELEBRATES FIFTY-THIRD
ANNIVERSARY
Imagination, self-reliance, and appreciation of beauty—
these three things must be developed if a college-trained
person is successfully to translate the theory of his college
days to the business of living, Miss Mary Beattie Brady,
director of the Harmon Foundation, told students, alumni,
faculty and friends of Spelman College who gathered
April 11 to celebrate the 53 rd anniversary of the found
ing of this pioneer institution of higher learning for Negro
women.
Miss Brady’s address was the climax of a day of cele
bration which included a program of athletic events, the
traditional decoration of memorials to the two founders,
Sophia B. Packard and Harriet E. Giles, and the formal
exercises of the afternoon in Sisters Chapel.
In her address Miss Brady packed a wealth of anecdotes
of her life as a young woman in Alaska, forced by circum
stances to manage the family farm when all the men-folk
or the village had been caught up in the industry of war
times, and later as the director of one of America’s great
social and educational foundations. Her fund of personal
experiences all pointed to the necessity of young people
developing their imaginations in order that they might use
effectively in life what they had learned in college or
drawn from books; of depending on their own resources
rather than being “leaners” on someone else, and finally
of bringing into their everyday life some of the great store
of beauty that is everywhere about them.
“We are all pretty much our own architects,’’ she said.
“We are exposed in college to an academic atmosphere, to
scientific knowledge, and our ways are directed along fun
damental lines. What we will do with this atmosphere,
this knowledge, and these fundamentals depends largely
on each of us. What are the qualities that we most need
if we are to make the fullest use of the fine opportunities
that have come to us during this ’browsing’ period. Three
things seem most helpful to me: imagination, self-help, and
appreciation of beauty’’.
The afternoon exercises were preceded by an academic
procession to the chapel in which the students of Spelman
College, faculty, and guests participated. The invocation
was delivered by President John Hope of Atlanta Univer
sity, the Scriptures were read by Reverend Robert Nathan
Brooks of Gammon Theological Seminary, and the bene
diction pronounced by Reverend E. R. Carter, pastor of
the Friendship Baptist Church, of Atlanta. The Spelman
Glee Club sang two numbers; “O Lord, Most Holy”
(Cesar Franck) and “Sanctus” (Gounod). The singing
by the assemblage of two spirituals, the college hymn, and
the Negro National Anthem completed the musical pro
gram.
The day opened with a parade of Spelman students who
were to participate in the athletic events of the morning.
The parade was headed by the Morehouse band, attired in
new uniforms of white, with maroon capes and caps. The
freshman class under the leadership of Helen Wingood, of
Lowell, Massachusetts, a freshman, gave a mass demon
stration of Danish gymnastics. Later the four classes par
ticipated in a field and track meet.
At an assembly in Howe Memorial Hall the traditional
ceremony of decorating the memorial tablets to the found
ers of the College was preceded by announcements of the
Founders Day gifts to the institution. The sprays of
spring flowers were placed on the memorials by a group
of students whose mothers or grandmothers had been stu
dents in the college. A feature of the morning’s assem
bly was the singing of a new college song, words and
music of which were written by Eddye Maye Money, of
Marianne, Arkansas, a senior.
SPELMAN’S GLEE CLUB CONCERT
We are firmly indebted to the Glee Club and to its
conductor, Mr. James, for one of the finest of musical
evenings. On Thursday evening, April 12, the Club
presented its annual performance and its most delightful
in several years. Each unit was a polished one, separate
in itself, but a very definite part of a harmonious whole.
(The splendid arrangement of Speak’s Silvia gave the
Glee Club its soaring note to excellence.)
But the voice that lyric voice of Miss Louise Smith
was the most refreshing wind that brushed us. It came
upon us with a quietness that was pleasantly disturbing.
We wondered most at the ease and sureness of Miss
Smith’s control. The voice ran madly or was reined in
at the singer’s mood, and to our joy. Miss Smith’s chief
—and very noticeable—claim to artistry was her power
to fuse her deep feeling with something in us. She star
tled us, but not too much to disturb our roguish interest
in the strange pathos her voice spoke of.
Me.
FIVE COLLEGES ENGAGE IN DEBATE
ON APRIL 13
The annual pentagonal league debates in which More
house College, Johnson C. Smith University, Knoxville
College, Shaw University, and Talladega participated were
held simultaneously in these colleges on Friday evening,
April 13. The subject of this year’s argument was: “Re
solved: That Economic Nationalism Is the Most Effective
Means of Obtaining International Economic Security.”
Each college deabted the affirmative of the question at
home and sent a negative team to another college. Under
the arrangement this year, Morehouse met Johnson C.
Smith at Atlanta, and sent its negative team to Knoxville
College. The balance of the schedule follows: Shaw at
Johnson C. Smith, Knoxville at Talladega, Talladega at
Shaw.
Morehouse defended the affirmative side of the question
at home with a team composed of Archibald L. Harper,
of Atlanta, and Louis Raymond Bailey, of Columbia,
South Carolina. Its negative team, consisting of Haron
J. Battle, of Cuney, Texas, and Frank B. Adair, Jr., of
Pine Bluff, Arkansas, traveled to Knoxville. The alter
nates were John Clinton Long of Atlanta, and Lawrence
A. Hall, of Daytona Beach, Florida.
Bailey and Adair represented Morehouse in its debate
last fall with Cambridge University. Bailey is a senior,
the editor of the “Maroon Tiger,” and in his third year
of debating. Adair is a senior, is active in campus dra
matics, and in his second year of debating. Battle is a
senior and president of the student body, and is debating
his third year. Harper also is a senior and a second year
debater.
Exactly one hundred and fifty students and three pro
fessors at Akron University signed a paper in which they
agreed to commit mass suicide by decapitation on Febru
ary 27. The college editors pulled the stunt to see how-
many would sign the document before reading it.
—Swathmore Phoen'x.